pinemom wrote:im gonna say no they wont allow you to bring dry ice on the airplane.

There was a post on this thread (at the beginning somewhere) where a burner almost passed out in her car due to the CO2 from her cache of dry ice. Since the cabin of a plane is a sealed environment, more or less, I bet dry ice would be highly frowned upon.

Dry Ice I was looking at had a warning about not storing it in your refirgerator. I suppose this is because of the CO2, but how, exactly, does it harm the freezer portion of your fridge?

well I was planning on catching the plane from Buffalo, but now I know a few friends are going I'm just gunna go with them, I really need to learn to drive sometime. And as for ice we've decided to use normal ice

If you're driving... and still want to do DI... there is a place in Reno called Crystal (no connection other than a long time cusstomer) on West 4th St that has it and is really fairly priced - and are *way* burner friendly.

Personally - I like the idea of having perishable and freezable food frozen until befire I use it. I have horrid luck sometimes with food going bad (roll of the cosmic dice) so I err on the side of caution. It seems to "burn off" at about 10 lbs/day in my Igloo 5 day behemoth... by the time Exodus Tuesday comes around (the traditional time I break camp and get outta dodge) its all gone but for the wrappers, but it's kept the wet ice I keep frozen for ice water at that point...

Plus, along about Thursday-ish, it's awful nice to be able to pull out some frozen Otter Pops... like Manna from heaven. Sweet, wet, and cold... almost as good as Bacon!

Bay Bridge Sue wrote:If you're driving... and still want to do DI... there is a place in Reno called Crystal (no connection other than a long time cusstomer) on West 4th St that has it and is really fairly priced - and are *way* burner friendly.

I'm sure they're open on Sunday, but call them and ask. I always show up when I blow thru town - on Wednesday...

Dry ice? Here's how I do it, and it works well. Get a GOOD cooler, line the inside with foil. A day or 2 before get 10 pounds and put it in the cooler to pre-chill it. Get a length of fiberglass batt for later...

When you get the DI wrap it tightly in plenty of newspaper - helps keep it from evaporating too fast (make sure you're wearing mitts, er, gloves - dry ice burns are no fun!!)... and when you get to the playa, make sure you DO NOT put the cooler directly on the playa (same for the ice cooler, BTW) - it will act like a big heat sink and suck your DI down about 3 times as fast, put the batting around (and on top of and under) the cooler and keep the cooler in the shade. Try to keep your main cooler closed as much as possible - work out of sub-chests...

My Main DI cooler is one of those big 5 day jobs... will hold about 80 lbs. I also have a smaller cooler I drop about 10 or so lbs into as my food freezer, and another small one with 10# as my wet ice keeper. DO NOT mix wet ice with your main stash of dry ice because it will kill your dry ice PDQ... and if possible, put the DI on top of the WI.

If it seems like a huge hassle, well, it might be, but I can keep stuff cold for pretty much the full 2 weeks I'm out there. By the time I blow out I'm down to the end of my wet ice, but it's still frozen...

Freeze as much of your drinks as you can. 32 oz gatorade bottles will last all week. They are contained ice, and as they start to melt you drink them, icy cold and refreshing. And also bottled water. As you travel the city you have cool refreshing drinks, keep them in an insulated carier to extend the cold factor. Freeze pre-made meals and thaw as you prepare them each day. The more frozen contained stuff that you can prepare, the less thawed ice you will end up within your coolers. We've also used the cooler drain off water in our portable camp tiolet, so were recycling grey water though our playa bathroom, so we don't use our fresh supply. Dry ice is good, it definetly extends the life of the coolers. Keep it on top. And don't feel bad about getting ice from Antartica in center camp, it helps the local tribal kids with fundage! I love having a cold soda as I'm leaving the dust behind on the trip home. As Dave Letterman says, " I don't beleve there is a man, woman , or child alive who doesn't enjoy a cool refreshing beverage".

I don't think it does... I'm looking at a brochure from Pain Enterprises (yes, that's their real name), and it says only that it shortens the life of your dry ice by about 50%, due to the circulation of air throughout the fridge and freezer.

*edit*

On their website, it says that it can cause your fridge to turn off its thermostat. Doesn't seem too terribly dangerous.

As of August 17th dry ice at Crystal Ice was .95 cents per lb. They are open Saturday and til 5pm during the week. I have to be in Reno at 5pm today so after I take care of my business there I'll swing by Crytals and get the hours and post them on the Share Resource thread. Probably won't post it til 8 or 9 PDT.

If I decided not to go the dry ice route, what can I expect by way of ice meltage if I decide to buy ice from Camp Artica -- provided I keep it off the ground & in shade? Daily? Twice daily?
There's 2 of us pulling from a 40-gallon cooler.
Thanks!

The lifespan of ice really depends on a lot of things. Your ability to keep the cooler out of the sun, how often you open it, how full it is, the quality of the cooler, ambient temperature, etc.

I would say on average, your ice will last 2 - 3 days, if it's a decent quality cooler, it's in the shade, off the ground, and you only open it when you need to. It's better to get into them while it's cool outside of course.

If possible, it's good to use two (or more) coolers so you can keep one sealed for later in the week. Just duct tape it shut, and don't touch it. If you shake it, and hear ice inside, your OK. If it feels like nothing but water, then you should open it and start over.

Block ice will last longer than cubed ice, but it's harder to pack.

Remember that the money you spend on ice goes to the local schools, and it's only $2 a bag. So, it may be best to just plan on re-stocking your ice every few days.

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[quote="griffin"]Remember that the money you spend on ice goes to the local schools, and it's only $2 a bag. So, it may be best to just plan on re-stocking your ice every few days.[/quote]

Ice will be $3 a bag this year. You'll be able to get 6 bags for $15 though so if you want to save a few cents a bag pool together with your neighbors and buy as a group. Another idea is when you need 5 get the 6th one for free and gift it.

[quote="antron"]do keep in mind that dry ice will carbonate many things if not segregated from your edible food.

carbonated milk is a kick. carbonated lettuce is not.[/quote]

This is so true, I had some whole oranges absorb the Co2 gas and become what I percieved as 'fermented'. It only makes sence as Dry Ice is solid form of Co2 gas. Both solids and liquide can/will absorb the gas.

As someone said, dry ice is good if you need to keep things frozen. It isn't cost effective if you want to keep things cool. The thing to remember with this is that most of the energy taken up (by machinery) in freezing a given thing goes to getting it through transition phases (especially if that thing is water) so once ice is ice, you can cool it a lot and it will only moderately increase its longevity in an icebox. If you want a really nice martini however, use cold cold ice, and it will be worth it.

Not for nothing, but I'll outline what worked perfectly for me and a friend last year. We got to the Playa on Sunday afternoon with early admission, and left on Monday after the burn. Drove from LA, leaving Saturday, and bought the dry ice in LA on Saturday...So it spent an 'extra' day before it even hit the playa. Food was fine the whole time. We used the 2-cooler idea: One strictly for dry ice, the other for food, using two 1.5-gallon bottles of water as block ice in the food cooler:

2 Coleman 5-day 62-quart coolers (er...model #6262...Yes, I'm a dork). Filled the first with dry ice and one of the water bottles. It was probably just under 30 pounds of dry ice. Filled the second cooler with perishable foods and the other (previously-frozen in the freezer at home) water bottle.

Once a day, swap out the water bottles. One freezes for the next day while the other one melts.

And...um...That's it!

Best part is there's no water left over anywhere. Just two empty coolers. And, no standing in line waiting for ice.

We did keep the dry ice cooler in or under the truck, and wrapped it with an emergency blanket for good measure. Doubt the blanket did much, but definitely gotta keep them out of direct sunlight.

Not trying to promote commercialism or this particular brand but I found this "brochure" at a grocery store and it had some good data on the basics of dry ice. Also, there is some neat scientific parameters for those who might want to experiment with it. I'm sure all of this data is well known or otherwise easily found but it's nice to see it all in one place.

Okay, so ten out of ten for style, but minus several million for good thinking, yeah?

We Americans with our refrigerators. Gawd, are we all drugs or something, and we're producing global warming like crazy, and it's like killing us with climate change, and we have no clue how to change. There has to be a better way.

So you've all just convinced me not to take any ice or cooler at all this year.

Dry ice really WILL freeze stuff. That mistake was made once in my early years when my hubby put some DI in with the beer and sodas. By the time we got to the playa (added the dry ice in Reno) the beer and soda cans had exploded.

I feed about 30 people and use a ginormous 5 day cooler as my "freezer". Freeze meats, ziplocs of spaghetti sauce, chili, etc before you leave and put your dry ice over the top of the food. I still have solid frozen food on Friday (and I come in early).

Ditto on further insulating the outside of your cooler. I use wool blankets (Army blankets) and occasionally wet them with ice melt when it gets really hot out. Raising it off the playa is also essential.

[quote="poeticphoto"]I was wondering how many people who don't bring generators and such to keep food cool/cold/frozen take dry ice? I've seen it mentioned on here somewhere before, but now I can't find the thread. If anyone does bring it, where do you get it from??? I've heard an ice chest would last nicely for the week in the heat. This is the route I'm planning to take, I'd just like to get some feedback. Anyone have experiences to share on the subject?[/quote]

This is something I'm thinking about too.
I need to find a way to store my medicine be cause the daytime heat will ruin them...

Make sure you get coolers with insulated lids.
Amazingly, many are just toy tops.
The better igloos also have harder liners, dividers for 2 litres and such and covered trays.
The good liners are easy to clean vs impossible.
I use two 50 quart.
Pack one with ice and dry ice and the other with food and ice and dry ice.
As the week goes by, I switch over to the all ice cooler.
Some think one big cooler works better- mass.
Having one not opened is a plus though.
I like the cool roller.
It also comes in a marine version.
I think the screw on caps are better.
They can be switched.

Some people just use a bunch of dry ice at the other end of the cooler.
Remember they give off Co2.

Remember, dry ice will impart a flavor to liquids. Also, if it is not food grade, it can be pretty nasty. IF you're gonna do smoky drinks, keep this in mind.

We experimented cutting ice cream into ice-cube sized blocks and then hard-freezing them using DI, and the result in those root beer floats and other fun things were amazing. We got tired of having to break the stuff up with an axe (literally!) and the ensuing moop... You still get some "inter-cube" adhesion that you have to break up, but for all intensive purposes (Vanilla ice cream and Baileys, for example) it works quite well.